New business coach strengthens SmiLes’ expertise in pharma and biotech

Charlotte Leife

SmiLe recruits Charlotte Leife as new business coach at SmiLe, thereby strengthening its expertise in the international pharma and biotech industry. Charlotte has extensive experience from leading position in both large and small companies and, amongst others, she has worked for the American biotechnology company Biogen and the Swedish pharmaceutical company Sprint Bioscience.

Charlotte Leife has a BSc in chemistry and an MBA from Uppsala University and she has extensive experience in working with commercialization in both large international pharma and biotech companies and in small startups. For many years she worked for the American, multinational biotechnology company Biogen, both as Managing Director for the Swedish and the Nordic subsidiaries and as SVP Global Commercial Excellence. She has also worked as CEO for Sprint Bioscience, a Swedish, entrepreneurial pharmaceutical company focusing on developing drugs for cancer.

“I am very happy to be able to welcome Charlotte to SmiLe. With Charlotte we bring in another senior business coach to complement the team with extensive, international industry expertise in pharma and biotech. With her background in both large companies – which are future customers of our member companies – and small startups, combined with the fact that she herself has worked as CEO in a listed environment, Charlotte will be a great asset for our incubator companies”, says Lina Olsen Boreson, COO for SmiLe Incubator.

Through the recruitment of Charlotte, SmiLes’ member companies will receive additional support in analyzing their business ideas, understanding the market and the customers as well as identifying potential obstacles early in the process, in order to reach the market faster and more efficiently.

”I look forward to being part of SmiLes’ team and contributing with my expertise. I am passionate about entrepreneurship in small companies, and I want to help manage the special drive that exists in these startups in the best possible way. It is a challenge to go from being an innovator to being an entrepreneur. From being completely focused on your product you now need to consider the whole company with all the challenges that brings in terms of for example business development, sales and financing”, says Charlotte Leife.

SmiLe focuses strongly on having a team of very senior business developers affiliated with the incubator, all of them with experience from the life science industry. In total, the members of the SmiLe team have more than 300 years of life science experience to share with the members.

For more information, contact: Lina Olsen Boreson, COO for SmiLe Incubator +46(0) 703 78 12 79, lina@smileincubator.life; or visit our news room